JUSTICE FOR AASIFA

Asifa's death has had Jammu and Kashmir on edge since last month. A chargesheet was filed by the state police's crime branch on Monday.

The minor was abducted, raped and murdered in Rassana village in Hiranagar tehsil of Kathua district in January. The body of the girl, from the Bakarwal community, was recovered from Rassana forest in Kathua on 17 January, a week after she went missing while grazing horses in the forest area.

On Wednesday afternoon, starting from the Jammu airport to Gandhi Nagar, in the heart of the winter capital, angry protesters, backed by the BJP and other parties, burnt tyres in the middle of roads and patrolled the city to enforce the strike. Several protesters were carrying bamboo sticks.

The issue that brought Jammu to grinding halt on Wednesday has failed to evoke outrage in the country. The rape of the eight-year-old nomad girl who, according to investigators, after being drugged and raped repeatedly inside a temple in Rassana village of Kathua district, a Hindu majority district where nomads have lived in peace for decades, has also exposed faultlines in Jammu and Kashmir's polity.

“She fell prey to a conspiracy hatched for months by Sanji Ram, the custodian of the temple. And in this horrifying story, a place of worship was used for the heinous crime,” a crime branch official in Jammu told Firstpost.

Ram, allegedly, used everything at his disposal — money, politicians and religion to subvert investigations by the crime branch. Allegedly, he also bribed the police and the university officials in Uttar Pradesh where his son is studying. His son, now in custody, arrived from his university to rape the minor girl, according to the chargesheet. But the agitators in Jammu have turned a blind eye to these grave charges.

NO ONE ELSE BUT WE THE RESPONSIBLE AND SENSITIVE PEOPLE OF INDIA CAN CHANGE THIS SITUATION , IT'S NOT JUST ABOUT AASIFA BUT RAPE AS A WIDE ISSUE IN THE INDIAN SUBCONTINENT, I URGE U ALL TO SIGN THIS PETITION AND BE A PART OF THIS MOVEMENT ,FOR A BETTER FUTURE